Day 5 Athletics & Hockey

This is by far our busiest day to date with 2 athletics sessions with a hockey sandwich in between. Our fellow guests from Oz and NZ are also going along so we head off to get the 34 bus which is also serving the campsite up the road.

The journey seems straight forward enough and doesn't prepare us for the journey home we face later in the day.

Good seats again allow us to watch our first live Gold for England in the Para Discus. The qualifying for the various events come at quite a pace and we enjoy the huge mix of events on offer at times unsure of what to focus our eyes on.

Due to event overlap and as England are playing the Aussies in the hockey we need to head off slightly early to get over to the hockey in time. We use yet another new route sussed out by the ever resourceful Miss O, the girl loves a map and a news et of directions. Again the journey is nice and simple and we head into the hockey in full anticiaption of a good match. The afternon is blessed with more hot sunshine and we feel we are melting as our anticipation for an England win is dashed as we fail to take our chances and Australia take theirs to win quite easily in the end. A better performance but not the hoped for result.

After the game we head back to Glasgow Central and join the queue for trains to Hampden. They seem to go on forever and this is where the travel for the day begins to fall apart. After managing to cope and get to the front of the queue onto a train we meet another one the other  end off the train and onto the stadium. Everything continues to move but the constant heat (yes in Scotland) is taking its toll and we are pleased when we eventually get into the stadium and are able to get into some shade.

The friendly party atmosphere soon takes over and the crowd roars on every race with particular support for the home natons and of course Scotland in particular. This culminates in a Gold medal in the Blind 100m for woman where the stadium erupts and then we are treated to Flower of Scotland which I soon realise I know more words to then Jeruselum. We are just pipped a gold medal for England in the 100m for men but get a great silver. A fabulous nights athletics ends and we head for the exits.

After managing to get out reasonably quickly we find the stop for the 34 bus back and are feeeling quite smug and happy about this. A 5 comes along and our Aussis pals jump on this as their seems some confusion over which buses are and are not running. We decide to wait as the driver says that there will be a 34. Big mistake we realise a chunk of time later and the Aussies not only beat us at hockey they beat us on getting a bus back to the B & B.

As we wait and think about our decison making process we realise most of the camp site are also waiting for the never to arrive 34 bus. As we enter converstation with them we realise they seem the most unlikely bunch of campers ever to be bought together. There is a particularly strange Welsh lady who then decides she is going to walk what would be over an hours journey in 45 minutes. She then manages to tag along with a couple of people who have ordered a taxi but do not know where to tell the taxi to collect them from.

We debate going to a taxi rank but does it really exist and then froma round the corner comes a number 5, do we or dont we get on it, as if we do it goes to the city centre but we do not know where and then we still have to come out again. Well a few of us get on and off we go, leaving a largish group behing we guess hoping that the 34 arrives which we learn later was a doomed wait as that is not a service that has extra buses running. Our journey is not aided by the driver who we think is Polish and doesn't seem to know the route. The bus eventually gets to the city centre where it stops and we all have to get off. Mmmmm what to do know. Well we have to know go and find another stop and its onto the 9 9A or 10. The final part of the journey is very simple and quick and as we get off we bump into another couple of more normal looking campers who had actually taken the train in  and are only just back.

We are more than happy to put the key in the door to our B & B and have a chuckle about the evenings events and the strange characters we encountered.

We are very happy that tomorrow is a free day and we have a spa booked for the day.

What a long and eventful day..........................GOODNIGHT ALL